Caroline Rothwell ‘Horizon’

26 June – 28 November 2021
Hazelhurst Arts Centre, NSW

Sydney-based artist Caroline Rothwell explores the intersection of art and science. Through sculpture, collaged historical prints and digital animations, Rothwell invites viewers to consider our relationship with the natural environment. Commissioned for Hazelhurst Arts Centre, Horizon looks out from an immediate frame of reference to the infinite and considers future possibilities.

In recent years Rothwell has been making regular site visits to Kurnell in Sydney’s south, the site of first encounters between Europeans and First Nations people on the east coast of Australia. In the Untitled series of works Rothwell slices into several of Joseph Banks’ Florilegium – the original engravings of botanical specimens collected at Kamay (Botany Bay) in 1770. Into each engraving she has inserted a pink tongue painted in watercolour, where its sinuous form disrupts the pages and their historical significance. The tongue is a repeated motif, weaving it way throughout the exhibition.

The installation also comprises a series of sculptural works and found objects, large-scale, digitally manipulated photographs of morphed weed species and video works.

Caroline Rothwell’s most recent exhibition was Bloom Lab at Tolarno Galleries in September 2021.

Image: Caroline Rothwell Blue Cabinet 2019 sculpture with Untitled 2019 works on paper (watercolour on Arches paper collage, on Joseph Banks’ Florilegium a la pope print from copper plate engraving)